Incredible performances of Sakshi Malik and PV Sindhu force Shobhaa De to eat her words.
Columnist Shobhaa De who had invited the ire of netizens for tweeting against Indian athletes has finally withdrawn her comments after Sakshi Malik had won Bronze medal in wrestling at Rio Olympics. The stupendous performance of shuttler PV Sindhu has further made Shobhaa to eat her words as she is trying hard to put the controversy behind her. On the other hand, megastar Amitabh Bachchan congratulated PV Sindhu after winning women’s badminton singles but he also took a jibe at Shobhaa by saying that he wants to click a selfie with Sindhu.
He tweeted. “#PVSindhu.. Aap “khaali haath” nahein, medal leke wapas aa rahein hain.. Aur hum aapke saath ‘selfie’ nikalne chahate hain!! (You are not coming empty-handed, in fact, you are coming along with a medal and I want to take a selfie with you),” he wrote.
In another post, Bachchan wrote, “#PVSindhu… Aapne ‘bolne walon’ ki bolti bund kar di.. Karm bolta hai aur woh kabhi kabhi ‘kalam’ ko bhi hara deta hai! BADHAI !! (You have made those people stunned, who talk unnecessarily. Hard work speaks and sometimes even defeats a pen! Congratulations!!).”
“Never ever underestimate power of female gender! #PVSindhu you have destroyed so many ‘naysayers’ .. you are the PRIDE of INDIA!,” he tweeted.
Earlier Shobhaa De had raked up a controversy by saying that Indian athletes are only interested in clicking selfies and will return empty handed from Rio Olympics. Twitterati criticised Shobhaa for making irresponsible comments against athletes. They also said that athletes work very hard for winning medals for India and many of them lack proper amenities to realise their dreams.
Even cricketer Virendra Sehwag took a dig at Shobhaa for passing comments against athletes.
His parody account @virendrsehwag tweeted, “#SakshiMalik ke gale me medal kitna “Sobha De” raha hai na”, which absolutely won the Internet over. The tweet went viral on social media.
He even retweeted his own post and mentioned “Bilkul , isliye Shobha Na De aise kaam nahi karne chahiye” he tweeted.
Even shooter Abhinav Bindra had given a befitting reply to Shobhaa De. Bindra responded saying: “Shobhaa De, that’s a tad unfair. You should be proud of your athletes pursuing human excellence against the whole world (sic).” Bindra, India’s sole individual Olympic gold medallist, finished fourth in the final of the men’s 10-metre Air Rifle final at the Olympic Shooting Centre in Rio de Janeiro.
Shobhaa De has been trolled repeatedly ever since she had tweeted about Indian athletes. She then issued a clarification and posted, “Whatever I said earlier, I want to put it behind me.”
In her tweets, De praised not only Sindhu but the two other women Olympians – wrestler Sakshi Malik and gymnast Dipa Karmakar – as well. She referred to the trio as “teen deviyan (three goddesses)”.
